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Rafuat hanefesh, u'rfuat haguf" -- healing the soul and healing the body.
Those words -- part of the Mi Sheberach prayer for healing recited every Shabbat -- demonstrate that the body and soul are inter-related, says Temple Emanuel Rabbi Warren Stone. And that is evidence that the issue of health care "ought to be up higher on [the Jewish community's] radar screen," he says.
Stone is one of a number of Jewish community leaders who hopes to raise awareness of the 44 million Americans who lack health insurance by participating in the third annual Cover the Uninsured Week, which began Monday and concludes on Sunday.
The project -- sponsored by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation with partners ranging from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to the AFL-CIO and the American Medical Association to America's Health Insurance Plans -- includes more than 1,000 events nationwide, among them health fairs for uninsured families, health coverage seminars for small businesses, discussions, public service announcements and the release of research on the issue.
For the second year in a row, it includes an interfaith component, hoping to make religious communities an integral part of its coalition.
At a meeting last week at Temple Emanuel in Kensington, organized by the Jewish Community...